The Bank of Korea plans to execute the R3 consortium proof-of-concept blockchain technology project. Kim Jung-hyuk, head of the e-finance planning team for the bank’s financial supervisory service, announced the project at the Digital Money 2017 conference, according to EconoTimes.

The R3 consortium is a working group of more than 70 of the world’s major banking and financial institutions.

Schedule To Be Announced

“We recently decided to proceed with the proof-of-concept with R3 Consortium, and once the final decision is made internally, the specific scope and schedule of the project will be announced,” Jung-hyuk said. “As a central bank, we were looking at different ways to utilize the blockchain technology.”

The bank created a task force team to oversee issuing digital currency. The task force will examine the effect of digital currency on the bank’s monetary policy and its financial stability.

A separate team will explore ways to issue, circulate and regulate digital currency trading, Kim said. He said the bank plans to organize a working group on other issues including invasion of privacy.

That announcement came just over a month after the formation of South Korea’s first blockchain consortium. A group of 21 financial investment companies and five blockchain technology firms signed a memorandum-of-understanding to develop distributed ledger solutions as a think tank for the Korean capital market.

The government-civilian consortium has been spearheaded by authorities like the FSC and the Korea Financial Investment Association.

The bank recently reported that it sees non-financial, technology-oriented companies to make a big splash in the country’s financial industry.

Fintech Moves Ahead

The report noted a number of global technology companies have entered the Korean financial market to introduce digital banking products, pushing adoption of financial technologies.

The report particularly pointed to blockchain technology and artificial intelligence as two innovations that have already seen implementation in the market.